LCS OTH Missile Procurement

An LCS recently sailed with the Kongsberg Naval Strike Missile (NSM)(see, "Kongsberg Naval Strike Missile") and launcher aboard (see, "LCS Giffords Naval Strike Missile").  While that, alone, will not turn the LCS from a useless debacle to a mighty warship, it is, nevertheless, a step in a more useful direction.  The plan appears to be to mount 8x NSM on each LCS.  There are 32 LCS built or shortly due to enter the fleet.  Thus, the minimum total missile inventory would be 8x32 = 256.  Presumably, the Navy would want several reloads available in inventory for each ship, in the event of war, thus bringing the total inventory requirement to around 1800 NSM or so.

LCS Giffords and Naval Strike Missile

Of course, the Navy considers several of the LCS to be non-deployable, training vessels so that might affect the missile inventory requirements somewhat, depending on whether the Navy considers these vessels non-combat capable in the event of war.  Setting that aspect aside …

From the Navy’s 2020 Budget Highlights we see a procurement plan for NSM of 101 missiles from 2020-24 inclusive.(1)  That’s an average acquisition of 20 missiles per year.  That’s significantly short of the 256/1800 requirement!  Of course, there’s no reason to believe that the acquisition will stop after 2024 but even continuing at the average of 20 missiles per year – or even the max budgeted rate of 26 missiles per year – it would require 65+ years to reach the required inventory level.

On a related note, the FY19 weapons budget document lists the cost of 8 NSM as $18,156,000 for an average of $2.3M per missile.(2)  Not cheap!

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*Update* - 

Here's projected quantities, costs, and unit costs from the FY20 weapons budget document: (3)

2020  18  $38,137,000    $2.1M
2021  15  $32,975,000    $2.2M
2022  16  $33,585,000    $2.1M
2023  26  $49,371,000    $1.9M
2024  26  $50,451,000    $1.9M

Still not cheap!
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As with most of the LCS program, one is left wondering what's going on?  Is the Navy serious about arming the LCS for war or just making a token buy of missiles so that a handful of deployed ships can have photo ops that the Navy can use to deflect criticism of the LCS program?

Another possibility is that twenty or so missiles is the limit of the manufacturer's production capacity.  If so, this would be very disturbing when one considers the numbers of missiles we would need to quickly acquire in a war.

I'm at a loss to explain what's going on here.

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(1)“Highlights of the Department of the Navy FY 2020 Budget”, Office of Budget – Mar 2019, Fig. 4-4, p. 4-8

(2)Department of Defense Fiscal Year (FY) 2019 Budget Estimates, Navy Justification Book Volume 1 of 1 Weapons Procurement, Navy, Volume 1 - xxii

(3)Department of Defense Fiscal Year (FY) 2020 Budget Estimates, Navy Justification Book Volume 1 of 1 Weapons Procurement, Navy, Volume 1 - xvii